The Land–Energy–Water–Climate Nexus and Sustainable Development Challenges

Dear Colleagues,

In the contemporary world, the mutual dependency between water, land, and energy is more obvious with the enhanced global climate and resource pressure. In particular, the potential climate crisis threatens the food and energy safety with lower resource utilization efficiency, and we need to explore the potential sustainable development challenges and find an effective path to reduce developmental risk. Hence, Land is publishing a Special Issue, entitled “The Land–Energy–Water–Climate Nexus and Sustainable Development Challenges”.

We are pleased to announce that the Special Issue is open to submissions, and the deadline for submissions is the end of December 2025. This Special Issue aims to publish high-quality, rigorously peer-reviewed, cutting-edge original research applying a multidisciplinary academic approach to topics relating to the land–energy–water–climate nexus and sustainable development challenges.

We welcome submissions on a broad range of topics: scientific and technical information on the land–energy–water–climate nexus and sustainable development challenges; knowledge on the relationship between the land–energy–water–climate nexus and sustainable development challenges in cities and regions; empirical studies on the sociocultural, political, and economic impacts of policies; assessments on the characteristics, equality, and justice of sustainable development challenges relating to the land–energy–water–climate nexus; and theoretical or evidence-based explorations on the effectiveness, popular inclusivity, and improvement directions of the governance of sustainable development. This multidisciplinary open access SI will help to disseminate and communicate scientific knowledge and impactful discoveries to researchers, academics, and the general public globally.

This Special Issue welcomes manuscripts linked to the following themes:

• Frontiers and reviews on the sustainable development challenges and the relationship between land, energy, water, and climate;
• Analysis of planning actions focusing on sustainable development in relation to the land–energy–water–climate nexus;
• Impact assessments on issues of land, energy, water, and climate that are arguably associated with sustainable development challenges;
• Cases of how scientific findings can be translated into prevention sustainable development challenges in relation to the land–energy–water–climate nexus;
• Theoretical explorations or case studies on the governance of sustainable development challenges in relation to the land–energy–water–climate nexus;
• Theoretic or empirical analysis of sustainable development challenges in the governance of urban and rural issues.

We look forward to receiving your original research articles and reviews.

Dr. Tao Shi
Dr. Qian Zhou
Dr. Qiang Li
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 250 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for assessment.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Land is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2600 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

• sustainable development challenges
• spatiotemporal evolutionary
• resilient development
• climate change
• land development
• energy change
• water utilization
• technological innovation
• ecological economics